Spark
by hauntedd
Summary: Elle's thoughts during Four Months Ago.  EllePeter.


Title: Spark  
Rating: PG  
Disclaimer: Not mine :)  
Characters: Elle, Peter, Elle/Peter  
Summary: Elle's POV during Four Months Ago.  
Spoilers: Through Four Months Ago.

* * *

She's not listening to Bob as he goes over the sales pitch. She's done it before, nodding and smiling, faking earnestness. It isn't who she is, but no one's ever cared about that. She hates this place more than anyone, but she doesn't know where else to go -- it's not like they have traveling circuses for living lightning.

It's when he tells her with a pointed look that Peter will be her assignment that her ears perk up a bit. She's never had one before -- so she must have done something right, for once.

Suddenly, this Petrelli guy seems a lot more interesting, even if he's going to be stuck in a cell for the rest of his life. Of course, he doesn't know that. Smirking, she traces her fingers against his face, shocking him into waking.

Peter's not a toy, her adopted father chastises, and she rolls her eyes, unconcerned as she suggests that he could be.

Elle's not kidding. She's sick of the Brit and whatever name he's using these days, four hundred years and he's still an asshole. It was embarrassing that he was her first kiss, but she had just turned eighteen and he was willing to oblige.

It wasn't like she had any real alternatives, until now. She doesn't even like him, not really. His hair is too maligned, his soul too broken, and frankly, she just doesn't give a shit. But he's _new_ and he's _hers'_ and that, at least, increases Peter's appeal.

--

Peter lets her cut his hair, too apathetic to protest as she trims the longer bangs from his face. She likes touching him, the feel of skin on skin, knowing that he is one of two people in the world that she can feel. He'll repair himself from her sparks, knitting skin back together without a second thought.

It's so rare that she gets to feel someone that she relishes it, never moving her hands from his body if she can help it. It's stupid and girlish, but she doesn't know any better.

He fingers the cup of pills in his hand, routine questions filling the silence that the snipping scissors creates. It's mundane and yet incredibly comforting, and for the first time in sixteen years she feels like every girl she's seen on television, with the friends and the boy and the life.

Elle watches him swallows his pills and she beams from ear to ear as she rests her chin on his shoulder and rubs her tiny hands up and down his muscular shoulders. He doesn't bristle at her touch and she feels relieved.

"Bye Peter," she grins as she steps away from him, finding herself more pleased with him than before. Pursing her lips, she runs her hand over his head, shocking him with glee.

"Ow, that hurts," he returns, running a hand over the back of his head as he stares her down, an unsaid question in his gaze.

Leaning her head against the door, she lifts her chin, her blonde hair spilling over her shoulders like she's seen thousands of times in movies when a woman tries to be sexy.

"You'll get used to it, and then you'll start to like it," she breathes, hoping that she sounds sexy, but knowing that there is an obvious desperation laced to her words. She really wants him to like her.

Elle's never been in love, but she thinks this is beginning to fit the description.

---

It's been two months of trying. Sparks on skin, banter wearing thin like the threadbare t-shirts Peter wears. It never takes this long for the actors on TV. She just wants to feel alive for a moment -- all she's ever been is power personified, valuable for the one thing that's caused her so much heartache.

He says that he's not in the mood for her touch today, and her reply is desperate, and she knows it. She promises him more pills, though she doesn't quite understand why he wants them so badly. Then she remembers -- he thinks he's leaving, eventually.

Elle knows he can't and it warms her heart more than anything to think about this. Everyone in her life has left her -- first death and then her parents sending her to that institution to die. But now she has Peter, and her Daddy, though he isn't really, and even that asshole, Adam, and life is finally beginning to come together.

Wrapping her arms around him, she pulls Peter closer to her body, looking like a six-year-old who got the pony she'd written to Santa about. Now, if only he'd kiss her.

Instead, he asks her about herself and she frowns, getting off of the bed and snapping at him defensively. Elle doesn't like this story, so she grabs his fingertips, hoping to change the subject.

Instead he gives her his diagnosis of her problems, like one of those shrinks she threatened with their lives, and for the first time, someone is right about her, and she hates it.

Spinning on her heal, she palms the door and tells him her story, which amounts to about a paragraph in a book of tragedies. It's all without explanation, except for her shrink's diagnosis, simple facts that frame her being.

She leaves without allowing him to respond, running down the hallways faster than she's ever had to before. All the television shows and movies make it seem like it's a huge relief to confide in someone, but she couldn't feel any worse than she does right now. But instead she locks herself up in her room and collapses against the door, crying until she can't do it any longer. Her throat aches, her eyes are red-rimmed and puffy and she can feel the electricity burning inside of her, begging for release. Screaming, she fires a bolt and lets her control slip for the first time in sixteen years.

Staring at the aftermath, Elle realizes that Peter is far more dangerous than her father realizes. And she likes it.

----

Peter doesn't talk to her for nearly a month after her confession, and she can't tell anymore if he's scared or just unsure what he should say. So they settle into a new routine, she drops off his pills, watches him swallow, and leaves. Her room becomes a prison again and her two-month love affair with this place is gone. Elle stops calling Bob _Daddy_, because she knows it pisses him off when she doesn't keep up with appearances.

"You're not going to give me a little jolt?" Peter finally asks, breaking the silence that's sprung up between them and the butterflies rise in her chest.

"Why? You want one?"

"Like you said, I'm starting to like them. I'm starting to like you," she wants to cry, but she doesn't. No one likes her. She kills things and she fakes happiness because it's easier to stay in control that way.

Maybe it's that they've both done it -- killed people accidentally that brings them together, or maybe the walls have closed in on him too.

"Fine, since you asked so nicely," she smiles, trying to hide her happiness as she reaches for him. But before she can shock him, Peter wraps his thick arms around her and drags her to the mattress. She can feel herself melting into him, but does nothing to stop him.

His lips are warm and inviting, so different from Adam, and she kisses back hungrily, hoping that its not obvious its only her second kiss. He responds by nudging her mouth open and she can feel her control slipping. Grinning mischievously, she shocks his lips and he presses his fingers against them in wonder before getting off the bed to take his pills.

Elle knows that he can't do what she can anymore, but she certainly felt sparks.


End file.
